Rising Costs Of Autopsies Effecting Putnam County EMS Budget

Rising costs of autopsies could have an effect on the Putnam County EMS budget.

Putnam County Coroner and EMS Director Tommy Copeland said inflation is to blame. He said there has been about a 25 percent increase in the past year.

“The folks that do our autopsies in Nashville have increased the cost to $2300 each for us,” Copeland said. “That’s up from about $1850 that we were paying, so that’s a pretty substantial increase.”

Copeland asked County Commissioners for additional money to cover the rising costs.

Copeland said he expects the number of autopsies to continue to grow as the area continues to increase in population. He said currently Putnam County usually performs about 80 Autopsies per year.

“This is kind of a side effect of growth,” Copeland said. “The more people we have here, the more deaths we’re going to have, the more autopsies are going to be necessary.”

Copeland said autopsies are needed when a death occurs under suspicious or unexplained circumstances. He said that for the time being not much can be done about the rising costs because the county is required by the state code to pay for autopsies.

“There’s very few places in the state that will accept private autopsies, there’s supposed to be another place coming online probably within the next year that can do them,” Copeland said. “We will have to see how competitive the pricing is there.”